We focused on the mind-life continuity thesis and the autopoietic account, which requires a reciprocal influence and determination of first- and third-person accounts. In this paper, we studied phenomenal data as a crucial fact for the domain of living beings, which, we expect, can provide the ground for a subsequent third-person study.

We are very thankful to the special contributions of Teresa Rodrigues from IMM, Faculty of Medicine, University of Lisbon, Portugal; Nuno Rosa, Maria Jose Correia, and Marlene Barros from the Institute of Health Sciences (ICS), Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Health (CIIS), Universidade Católica Portuguesa, (Viseu, Portugal); and Mário Simões from LIMMIT lab, Faculty of Medicine, and Mind-Brain College, from the University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal. The authors also wish to thank Michael Kirchhoff for his insightful comments on the paper, and the Lisbon Wide Minds Group for the fruitful discussion during the presentation of the project at Nova University of Lisbon. The authors would like also to thank the important comments of the reviewers, and the patience of the editors. Inês Hipolito would like to acknowledge that this paper was made possible by an International Postgraduate Award from the University of Wollongong, Australia.

​AbstractThere are two fundamental models to understanding the phenomenon of natural life. One is the computational model, which is based on the symbolic thinking paradigm. The other is the biological organism model. The common difficulty attributed to these paradigms is that their reductive tools allow the phenomenological aspects of experience to remain hidden behind yes/no responses (behavioral tests), or brain ‘pictures’ (neuroimaging). Hence, one of the problems regards how to overcome methodological difficulties towards a non-reductive investigation of conscious experience. It is our aim in this paper to show how cooperation between Eastern and Western traditions may shed light for a non-reductive study of mind and life. This study focuses on the first-person experience associated with cognitive and mental events. We studied phenomenal data as a crucial fact for the domain of living beings, which, we expect, can provide the ground for a subsequent third-person study. The intervention with Jhana meditation, and its qualitative assessment, provided us with experiential profiles based upon subjects' evaluations of their own conscious experiences. The overall results should move towards an integrated or global perspective on mind where neither experience nor external mechanisms have the final word.

We invite chapter contributions for the volume “The Mind-Technology Problem – Investigating Minds, Selves and 21st Century Artifacts” forthcoming in the book series Studies in Brain and Mind (Springer). This book explores the relation between philosophy of mind and emerging technologies. Technologies that only recently seemed to be science fiction are becoming part of everyday life. Our life is increasingly saturated with 'smart' artifacts. The ubiquitous and mobile Internet amounts to a radically new epistemic and cognitive environment which we already inhabit. This smart environment is saturated with artificial intelligence systems that not only guide us to information on the Internet, but are transforming the way we inhabit the non-virtual realm: the home, the urban environment and beyond.

In the process, these technologies may be viewed as a form of rapidly evolving cognitive enhancement (Schneider, 2016, Heersmink, 2015). They may also be radically changing the human cognitive profile (Schneider and Mandik, 2016, Clowes, 2015; Clark, 2007) including the possibility of mind uploading (Corabi and Schneider, 2012). Some see these trends as deeply worrying, undermining a raft of our cognitive and social capacities (Carr, 2010; Turkle, 2011). Others see the relationship as a more of a continuum with the long history of artifactually led, cognitive evolution of human beings (Malafouris, 2013; Clark, 2003).

These technologies appear to have important implications for the human mind, sense of identity and even perhaps what we think human beings are. Other technological tendencies may stretch our ideas further toward super-intelligence, (within the skin) cognitive enhancements, and more distantly perhaps, machine consciousness. Yet while ideas of artificial general intelligence, cognitive enhancements and a smart environment are widely commented on, a serious analysis of their philosophical implications is only now getting started.

In this edited volume, we seek the best philosophical analysis of what current and near future 21st technology means for the metaphysics of mind. Some of the questions still open include: Should the adoption or incorporation of current technologies, such as smart phones or wearable gadgets be viewed as enhancements or diminishments of the human mind? Or is such a framework too restricted? Might they transform the sorts of self-knowledge available to us, or what self-knowledge is? Might the use of such gadgetry force us to rethink the boundary between human beings and technology, or indeed enduring philosophical questions such as personal identity or what the self is? According to various theories of personal identity, are radical cognitive enhancements even compatible with personal survival?

In thinking about minds, there is a common tendency to define the ontological status of the mind in terms of whatever is the latest technology. The computational model of mind has certainly been one of the most influential and is currently undergoing important challenges and challenging reinventions (Schneider and Mandik, 2016). Is the notion that the mind or self as a program, which often guides public and philosophical discussions, metaphysically well founded? Whether or not our minds are actually computational, our ability to interface with machines, from virtual reality technologies such as Oculus Rift to our smart-phones and wearable gadgetry, are undergoing a profound shift and are rapidly reshaping the metaphors and concepts philosophers use to think about minds and the conclusion they draw (Metzinger, 2009; Chalmers, 2007).

As a follow up of our “Minds, Selves and 21st Century Technology” meeting in Lisbon (http://mindandcognition.weebly.com/mind-selves-and-technology.html), we seek high quality submissions that investigate the philosophical implications of the engagement between 21st century technology, metaphysics and the philosophy of mind. We are especially interested in submissions that do not indulge in extensive futuristic speculation but focus on current or near-ready technologies which are already changing the shape of the human (and machine) cognitive landscape and our philosophical understanding of mind. Research question include the following:

Extended Mind, Extended Cognition, Distributed self: · How should we think of distributed and extended memory in the context of 21st century technology? · Can artifacts make possible new forms of extended self-knowledge? What are the consequences of artifacts—for instance, the ubiquitous smart-phone—for notions such as the minimal self, the narrative self, or the distributed self? · What is the role of cognitive artifacts in the cognitive enhancement debate?

Metaphysics of the mind: · Does the current state of the art of machine consciousness, brain enhancement or smart ambient technology warrant predictions and extrapolations on questions like personal identity, privacy, super intelligence, etc. many want to make? · Does current work in this realm tell us anything about phenomenal consciousness? The organization of mind? The possibility of artificial minds? · Do hierarchical predictive processing systems support the theoretical literature on the metaphysics of mind (mind, big data, minds online, deep minds)?

Radical Brain Enhancement and Uploading: · Would an uploaded mind be me? Is mind uploading a myth? · Does radical brain enhancement challenge our sense of self, personal identity and / or humanity?

Researchers, practitioners, clinicians and other professionals from Australia and internationally are invited to submit abstracts for presentation at the 2017 Neuroscience & Society Meeting in Sydney, Australia. The meeting will feature a wide range of exciting scientific lectures and ethical, philosophical and legal discussions, with numerous networking opportunities with experts, researchers, and emerging leaders in the field of neuroethics and neurolaw.Abstracts are invited from those working in the fields of ethics, law, neuroscience, mathematics and engineering, psychology and psychiatry, philosophy, allied health care, and public policy.

Abstracts of an empirical, legal, and philosophical nature related to the field of neuroethics are welcomed. Investigators at all career stages are encouraged to submit one or more abstracts.Abstracts will be peer reviewed and acceptance will be based on content, available space, and overall program balance. A small number of selected abstracts will be invited for an oral presentation. Other selected abstracts will be invited for a poster presentation.

Presentations are welcomed on any neuroethics topic, although particular consideration will be given to those addressing the key conference themes of:​Ageing and dementiaThe developing brainDisabilityand mental healthDisorders of self controlMoral cognition and moral technologiesArtificial intelligence and machine learningNeurolaw

Selected papers will be invited to be submitted to a special issue of the journal Neuroethics. All papers will undergo peer review — an invitation will not guarantee publication. Enquiries may be emailed to Adrian Carter or Jeanette Kennett.

Already online my paper “Anatomy of Language”. I’m thrilled with this paper because it is the first one I write and publish in my mother thong, the Portuguese.

It is significant topic because the paper attempts to draw an evaluation upon the empirical methods and theoretical frameworks adopted in the study of metaphor. The perspective in this paper was particularly to look at the conception of metaphor in neuroscience and psycholinguistics, against the notion of language games. The major aim was to see whether this notion of metaphor as a language game remained hidden, or not, from empirical lenses of behavioural paradigms (e.g. times response), and brain pictures (imagiology).

The linguistic turn could not anticipate that the 21st century would be dominated by cognitive states of linguistic encoding penetrating propositional attitudes, - even in the case of metaphors. Wittgenstein, on his return to philosophy, did substitute the conception of language as exclusively a set of axioms, and meanings of truth conditions by the notion of language games and forms of life. I guess he would agree with our Portuguese poet, there are metaphors, which are more real than the people walking on the street (BS, Book of the Disquiet).

I am thankful to the editors of Kairos, and, of course, to the reviewers who helped me bringing my ideas into clarity.​*

Empedocles is the first to bring forth a theory of color. In color vision, he says, the eye somehow takes in, or physically ‘ingests’ material effluences emitted by the distal object. Demokritos further attempted to explain the characteristics of particular colors by reference to the characteristics of the atoms constituting them. Like Demokritos, Plato also reckoned with self-radiating objects; but Plato thought that their rays meet and mingle with the pure fire (rays) placed in all human eyes by the gods. In the Timaeus, Plato states that particles coming from other bodies fall upon the sight. Thus seeing (or not seeing) depends on the size, strength and speed of the rays emanating from the objects, while perception of the various colors depends also on that process (see Benson, 2000).​Aristotle rejected the notion that a fiery ray emanated from the eye and reflected back from the objects to create sight—on the grounds that if this were so, night vision would be normal. By the same token he objected to the theory of emanations from objects, since the eye does not perceive them when the objects are pressed against the closed eye. He postulated the necessity of a medium between the eye and its percept, and reached back to the Presocratic translucence (diaphanes), which exists in water, air and translucent objects. Light is the agent (energeia) that reveals translucence as an incorporeal state ranging from bright to dark. Insofar as this flows into objects it ceases being mere light and reveals color as well as their substantiality. The color of the object in turn puts the medium itself in motion and this is transmitted to the eye. Obviously, the role of light is to make this process possible, but Aristotle attributes no movement to it, whereas the resulting color is an activator (kinetikon) of the medium (Benson, 2000). Aristotle’s theory of color contrasts thus with Empedocles[1] and Plato, in the sense that “the assimilation of the sensible form without the matter of the perceived object” is how Aristotle defines perception: “color is a power to move, or alter, what is transparent”. He draws a clear distinction between the physiological activity in the eye and the sensory presentation of color to the perceptive part of the soul. Aristotle conceives of light as incorporeal activity. It is a state of a potentially transparent medium, a state akin to, or equivalent to, a state of illumination.

For Aristotle, a substance together with its accidents forms a certain whole. The whole would seem to be such that substance is the first part, after which come quality, quantity, and the other accidents (Metaph. XII, in init.) (Brentano, 1981, p. 82). Aristotle is convinced that whole and part can never be actual simultaneously. At the root of his theory of categories is a theory of the relation of whole and part. If the whole is actual, then the part is merely potential. How does this applies to a thing extended in space? Conceptually, the accident always contains the substance, hence the real unity of the accident. Concept red contains, in Aristotle’s view, the concept colored, and the concept colored contains the concept sensibly qualitative. What is in question in Aristotle’s theory of categories is thus that it is not the plurality of individual parts; rather all attributes entering into the definition determine one and the same individual. Like any other scientific terms, “category” as undergone several changes of meaning in the course of history, Brentano himself disagreed in several arguments with Aristotle (see Brentano, 1981, part II pp. 81-89). Nevertheless, “this much is certain: he [Aristotle] thought that there was a sense of the term being for each category; and in making the classification, he wanted to distinguish as many different senses of being” (Brentano, 1981, p. 90). Thus, to arrive at the true understanding of perception, we must see the distinction between a subject and that which the subject underlies, such as sensible, quality, place, real time, extension, shape, – in fact, substantial determinations.

[1] For a detailed analysis, see Kalderon, M. E. (2015). Form without matter: Empedocles and Aristotle on color perception. OUP Oxford.

I am doing exploratory research on the nature of color perception. In order to develop operational definitions, could I ask you to help me out by ordering the following colored squares? Please send a private message (below) with your response/order. I know this is not an easy task, thank you so much for helping me out here!

Please order the colours.

Friends and Colleagues,

We are pleased to announce the reformation of the Australasian Society for Cognitive Science (ASCS). The main activity of the society has been the organisation of conferences. The society now aims to run regular conferences every second year with an eye to becoming the peak body for the interdisciplinary study of the mind in Australasia. The first major event for the reformed society will be a conference held at the brand new Port Macquarie (yes we have an airport, along with our beaches and rainforest) campus of Charles Sturt University on the 7th and 8th of December 2017. Max Coltheart (Macquarie) will keynote the event. This event will include a general meeting of the society to endorse a new constitution and elect a committee consisting of a president, general secretary, treasurer, student representative and communications officer. We will also be seeking expressions of interest from those wanting to host the next conference in 2019. Much more information about the conference will be forthcoming in the next weeks. For now, interested parties are asked to contact Glenn Carruthers (glenn.rj.carruthers@gmail.com) to be added to a mailing list where information about the society (including a draft constitution, call for nominations for committee positions and information about conferences) will be distributed. Please forward this onto any potentially interested parties.

Sincerely

Glenn Carruthers on behalf of the ASCS reformation advisory committee

I am delighted to share with you what Valeria and I have been up to. Our paper, Predictive engagement and motor intentionality, will be shortly published in the philosophicalEsercizi Filosofici. We are happy how the MS turned out after the insightful comments of the anonymous reviewers, and we are also very thankful to the Lisbon Mind and Cognition Group.We aimed to show that motor intentionality, as the underlying ground for social cognition, can be explained through the predictive engagement model. Sensorimotor processes seem to play central roles in social interaction, cognition and language, or at least this is the hypothesis that we trace here. We start by questioning the phenomenological role of the body in social cognition, to further investigate a causal neural explanation. In order to do so, we link the role of the body and intercorporeality with recent findings in philosophy of neuroscience under the predictive brain hypothesis. The living body seems to entertain a dialogical and enactive relationship with the surrounding context, as well as with neural circuits actively responding to external stimuli, which is why, in our perspective, the body, configured as a living organism, and not as mere biological substratum, offers to phenomenology and empirical sciences further confirmations of the possibility and need for a cooperation.

This is the first of our Philosophy Forum Presents events for 2017. Philosophy Forum Presents are regular talks on philosophy given by guest speakers. The talks are aimed at those new to philosophy and all are encouraged to attend and participate. The details for the first event are as follows: Speaker: Prof. Marc Slors, Professor of Philosophy of Mind (Radboud University, The Netherlands). Title: Farewell to Free Will? Date: Wednesday 1 March 2017Time: 17.00-17.45Venue: LHA Research Hub (Building 19, Room 2072).